LA Studios Are Already Booking New Shoots in New Hampshire

LOS ANGELES—Putting the lie to Assemblyman Isadore Hall's assertion yesterday that California-based adult production companies are full of hooey when they say that shooting in the state will no longer be an option for them if Hall's mandatory barrier protection bill AB 1576 becomes the law of the land, several large studios as well as smaller operations are already making plans to shoot back East this summer. In fact, AVN learned today that New Hampshire-based Wasteland.com, a venerable producer of quality BDSM content, fielded a stream of calls this morning from California studios interested in using their facilities for adult productions planned for this summer. All of this came about in the immediate aftermath of the approval yesterday by the Appropriations Committee of the California Assembly of Hall's mandatory barrier protection bill, which now moves to the full Assembly for consideration next week, and which, if passed by both the Assembly and Senate,will move to the governor's desk to be either signed into law or vetoed. AVN spoke with Wasteland founder Colin Rowntree about this very recent development, and though AVN will not name the studios that have contracted to use their facilities, we can say that two of them are very well known brands. AVN: You mentioned that studios have been contacting you? When exactly did this start and how many calls have you gotten thus far? Colin Rowntree: This all started out with me posting a story on a blog about "Come to New Hampshire To Shoot Porn," in the midst of the California impending exodus. It was a satire piece, as NH is not a real nice climate, but it is legal to shoot porn here, so some folks seemed to have taken notice. We got three calls in the past 24 hours from California studios asking if they could come to our little "New Hampshire Armory" to shoot bareback. What exactly are they asking you and are they wording it in such a way that they just want to get as far away from LA as possible? What everyone seems to want is a safe and legal place to shoot without condoms, and all seem to want to have such safe haven for this sort of content out of the bounds of Los Angeles and California. Many intend to stay in California for condom shoots, but I am hearing that people want to have something in the United States that is legal for their libraries. What sort of shooting accommodations do you offer? How much can people expect to pay? We have a 7,000 square foot really big house here in the New Hampshire woods. Very remote. Very secure. I took a little poll of L.A. folks on rates and they said rentals in California were running anywhere from $200 an hour to $10k a day in the nicer areas of the state. So we set a reasonable price of $1k a day here, and there is a great Maple Syrup barn right down the street! How extensive are the shoots they want to do? Do you get the feeling that this could become a regular thing? Most are looking for at least 4 days per month @ $1k a day with a minimum of 4 days. Do you have an elevator pitch for shooting porn in New Hampshire? No. New Hampshire sucks in almost all aspects aside from it being legal to shoot here. The winters are horrid and the summers are short. Are these productions happening? Have you signed on the dotted line? Dotted line signed with several. This is fantastic as we can pay the heating bills next winter here! While Rowntree encouraged interested producers to take a look at the Granite State, he added a word of caution, stating, "Coming to New Hampshire is a great move for California folks who want to crank out a lot of bareback scenes, but only in a limited time frame. May through September is the window to avoid the bad weather and travel issues bringing performers in. We do have a venue that can accommodate some, but not a lot. We're close to Logan Airport and pretty fancy by East Coast standards, but New Hampshire is not your solution if you are a larger studio. There is simply not the infrastructure here to support the adult industry." Rowntree added that anyone interested in shooting at his place (and maybe freezing their ass off) can contact him at rowntree2007@gmail.com. Image: A New Hampshire homestead that is NOT the home of Wasteland.com.